


you are the life i needed all along

by iwillbeyourgoal



Category: The Adventure Zone (Podcast)
Genre: During IPRE, Fluff and Angst, M/M, Post-Canon, Recovered Memories, Temporary Character Death
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-15
Updated: 2017-10-15
Packaged: 2019-01-17 16:16:25
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,623
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12369429
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/iwillbeyourgoal/pseuds/iwillbeyourgoal
Summary: "i think of you as my brother, although that sounds dumb/and words are futile devices"along with the other memories he's gained from the stolen century, taako starts remembering his relationship with magnus on the starblaster.





	you are the life i needed all along

**Author's Note:**

> i had no idea i was a taagnus (?) shipper until this hellsite told me i was. so here is my contribution!! 
> 
> title is from sufjan stevens' "futile devices"

When you’re remembering, all at once, one hundred years’ worth of pain and joy and fighting and winning and losing and dying and _living_ –

 Well, it gets to be a bit much. Headaches are involved, naturally, and it wouldn’t be uncommon for someone to pass out afterward. But what isn’t as obvious is the fact that, for a while afterward, new memories keep coming, showing up like distant relatives to your house at Candlenights.

Taako is readying himself for the final battle against the Hunger when one such memory hits him. He stumbles back against the wall of the room he’s in, clutching his head.

_“Hey, doof!” Taako calls to Magnus across the deck of the Starblaster as he tosses him an apple. “Here. Eat something from the ground for once in your sorry life.”_

_Magnus catches it and grins, stirring something deep in Taako. “Nice try,” he replies, throwing it back. “Plants are for nerds.”_

_Smirking, Taako reaches out one hand to grab the airborne apple. “This – this is catch now. We’re just playing catch.”_

_“Fine with me,” Magnus shrugs. “Games are fun. Ya ever have fun, Taako?”_

_“Not the kind we can talk about in polite company, cookie,” he says, tongue curling lewdly against his teeth._

_They’re two and a half cycles in, and Taako is amazed it’s taken him this long to start flirting with Magnus. But it doesn’t feel like the flings he’s had before now. Maybe it’s because of their commitment to save as many worlds as they can for as long as they can. Maybe the stakes are higher._

_Maybe it’s because it’s Magnus._

_They continue like that for a few hours more (it’s a slow day) and as Magnus tosses the apple back for the last time before heading to bed, he winks at Taako._

_“Night, cookie,” he says. As he turns the corner, Taako whistles under his breath._

_This feels like trouble._

 

Blinking, Taako is back in the room, his weapons before him. He screws his eyes shut and shakes his head – it is beyond not the time to focus on that memory right now.

 

While he continually recovers other memories, the second Magnus memory (as Taako refers to the first one in his brain) doesn’t come until after the battle with the Hunger is won. The wizard is strolling down a cobblestone street near the house he and Kravitz have been living in when, suddenly, he’s not.

“God, not again,” he says, eyes squeezed shut and head pounding.

_Magnus is sitting on the edge of Taako’s bed, his legs swinging arrhythmically. Taako, applying makeup at his desk, catches a glimpse of this sight in the mirror and snorts._

_“Y’know, sometimes I forget you’re just a kid,” he murmurs, leaning in to the mirror and brushing mascara through his lashes._

_“A_ kid _?” Magnus replies indignantly. “My body may be 22 but I’m technically 31! I’m an adult!”_

_Taako notices his legs hadn’t stopped swinging and allows himself a small smile. “Elves don’t become adults until they’re 100.”_

_The obstinacy melts from Magnus’ demeanor as he tilts his head in curiosity. “Really?”_

_Taako nods as he gives up on the makeup routine for the time being and joins Magnus on his bed. “If you were an elf you wouldn’t even know how to tie your shoes yet,” he says warmly. “You’d only just be beginning. Hell, you_ are _only just beginning.”_

_Magnus smiles a little at this, and as he shifts his weight, his hand partially covers Taako’s. He blushes as he jerks his head up to look at Taako, and the elf returns the stare, an uncharacteristically bare look in his eyes. Neither of them moves their hand._

_It feels like everything – all the death, the weariness, the constant, never-ending fighting they’ve had to do so far – is compounding here. The act of leaning in to kiss feels more like falling than anything that indicates premeditation._

_Magnus kisses more roughly than Taako would have guessed, or maybe it’s just been so long for the both of them that desperation overtakes any actual skill. Taako brings his hand up to feel Magnus’s hair, something he’s wanted to do for at least five cycles now. It’s soft and as he tightens his grip, Magnus groans against his mouth._

_Yep, Taako thinks as he moves to lick Magnus’s ear. This is sure as shit trouble._

 

Whatever present-day Taako was expecting, that was not it. He’s sunken to his knees on the side of the street – the memory only took a few minutes, but he wonders if that’s how long he’s been out of it.

God – him and Magnus? That was something that happened – something that Taako had wanted to happen? _I mean, as far as dudes go, I could’ve done worse_ , he thinks, before he’s struck with a huge wave of guilt.

Kravitz – Kravitz, whom he loves, very much – is waiting for him at home. The home that they’ve made together. And here Taako is, having sexy memory time with his old buddy Mags in the street. Boyfriend of the year, he is.

Scrubbing his eyes until he sees spots, he shakes his head and turns to head home. Introspection is for chumps, he decides.

 

The next, and final, Magnus memory comes only three days after the previous entry in this particularly weird chapter in Taako’s memory recovery. He is, thankfully, sitting down for this one, on a bench by a lake. As he feels the sudden, but dull, pain that indicates an incoming memory, he braces himself. “Let’s do it,” he says, closing his eyes and taking a deep breath.

 

_Running. Run, come on, just run, just a little bit farther – right? Are we even going the right direction? Taako has no idea, and Magnus’ entire left leg is soaked in blood, blood from a gash so deep he thinks he can see bone._

_The inhabitants of this planet – huge creatures that looked like mutated sloths with sharp, curved claws – were antagonistic from the word go, but when Taako and Magnus set out to find the Light of Creation, that antagonism turned to violence. Taako managed to escape the ambush relatively unharmed, but one of the creatures clawed at Magnus as they began to escape and dug a significant chunk out of his leg._

_Taako damns himself for wasting his spell slots on – on_ what _? What the fuck could have been more important than healing Magnus? He can’t even remember what, that’s how inconsequential it had been. Merle is probably a million miles away on the other side of the planet, and the way Magnus is limping, if they didn’t get back to the ship in the next five minutes, he..._

_“I – Taako.” He hears Magnus rasp his name and turns quickly to face the man._

_“What? What is it?”_

_All color has been drained from Magnus’s face, which is usually a very attractive ruddy shade. He’s also shaking, just barely, but Taako can pick it up. He looks at the elf and attempts a smile._

_“We can stop running,” he says, hobbling over to an embankment by the path they’ve been following. “Come on. Come over here.”_

_“Fuck that,” Taako says, shaking his head furiously. “We’re gonna get your ass healed is what we’re gonna do. It’s just a little bit farther – ”_

_“You don’t know that,” Magnus retorts softly, and Taako can tell his strength is fading fast. “I know you don’t know where we are.”_

_“That – that doesn’t matter, we need to – ”_

_“Taako!” Magnus yells, wincing with the amount of energy it must have taken. “Fucking come over here and sit with me, okay? Would you just fucking do that for me?”_

_More than anything in the entire world, Taako doesn’t want to do that. Because this will be the first time Magnus dies in a cycle. And Taako doesn’t want to have to be here when it happens. He doesn’t want to fucking see the life drain from his eyes. He wants more than anything to turn and run._

_But he finds himself moving to sit beside Magnus._

_Magnus smiles and leans against a tree. “Thank you,” he says. He takes Taako’s hand and weaves their fingers together before adding, “You doof.”_

_Snorting unwittingly, Taako shakes his head. “I can’t believe you still don’t eat anything, like, natural.”_

_“Meat is natural,” he protests. “They are of nature.”_

_“You’re a mess.”_

_“But you love me.”_

_Taako’s breath hitches as he looks at the man beside him._

_“I know you won’t say it, so I’ll say it for you,” Magnus shrugs._

_He can’t respond to this, just blinks and squeezes Magnus’s hand._

_They don’t say anything for a few minutes after this. Magnus gasps and groans as he continues bleeding, and he looks at the elf. “I can feel it coming, Taako,” he says._

_Taako nods and kisses Magnus, who dies shortly thereafter._

_He doesn’t cry on the way back to the Starblaster, but he doesn’t talk to anyone for weeks._

As Taako comes back to the bench by the lake, though, he _is_ crying. He remembers now. He did love Magnus. He wouldn’t have ever said it back then, but he did.

And he loves him now. Not in the same way – but maybe, in this way, it’s better. It’s a love that’s grown into friendship, something Taako had rarely ever experienced before the Bureau of Balance. These new memories, he realizes, don’t do anything to take away from his relationships with Magnus or Kravitz. They’re just part of what he went through, and who he needed to get through it.

The next time he sees Magnus, he hugs his friend a little harder than he usually does. He hopes it says what he doesn’t.


End file.
